confessions of a homebody (in regards to traveling, and writing) (update Aug 8, 2026)

As some of you may know, I have recently been upset with my lifestyle. In an effort to get myself out of that slump, I decided to reinforce my quota of a post per week. I used to do this back in freshman year. I used some excuse about wanting to write better posts to excuse my lack of activity. This time, I will not be using that excuse. I expect great quality whilst still maintaining this upload schedule (I realize anyways that I do just write things in one draft and never really touch it up afterwards, though sometimes it happens where I take quite a bit mulling about how to write things). I cannot say for sure that I will maintain this throughout the semester, but in this brief period of time before school starts, I will try to post once per week.

This initiative is a result of a confluence of different forces: talking to people about literature, listening to one talk about how they love watching movies in their free time, realizing how much fun it is to write reviews for books and cafes, and perhaps most importantly, a certain video about writing. A part of the video that made an especially deep impression on me was about finding a location to write. The creator (speaker? writer? author? narrator? not sure what to use here) explains that his favorite location to write is in the public library. It's much better than writing at home, as that leads to staying at home the entire day, and that gets rather depressing rather fast.

And so I thought about where I like to write. I refuse to work in my room. My room is where I play video games, and it is quite difficult to avoid that temptation when I am in my room. Instead, I quite like writing in cafes (I've noticed that the decline in my writing output seems to be positively correlated with my decline in going to cafes in Boston).

Which brings us to where I am on this Saturday, sitting in a cafe, writing. In a rare instance of incredible foresight, I did not schedule anything on the last weekend in which I am in Europe. I decided last night after going home early and playing my fair share of games between moving the laundry that I was going to end the night with a movie (it ended up being The Truman Show, which I didn't get to finish because the piracy website I was using is shitty and it stopped loading halfway through) and start the next day going to some cafe. I fell into sleep easily and was interrupted by an alarm that I don't remember setting. I naturally turned it off and went back to what I was doing (ie. sleeping). I woke an hour later and meandered through my morning routine before heading out to this cafe.

It's a nice weekend morning, today. No alarm in the middle of the night to get on a train to go somewhere. No forcing my eyes open so I can make the most of my day in this European city I won't come back to for years. No sleeping past noon because I finally arrived in my room after the sun rose. No place I have to visit, no work that I feel the need to catch up on. Just a wish to try a filter coffee and write something pretty.

I don't really need to travel more, anyways. What is there to see anyways? I've been to plenty of cathedrals; prayed and cried in plenty of cathedrals. The castles and palaces were nice the first few times, but afterwards I really don't think it's worth the entry ticket. I'm sure there is a lot of history in the places that I've gone, but I am illiterate at history and all I can do is squeeze out an apathetic "oh that's cool."

There are two things that I do enjoy, which is art and food. I've been to a couple art museums, classical, modern, and contemporary. It's helped me identify my taste. I don't like the Dutch masters and pop art. Greek and Roman statues are very much worth visiting in person, especially those that are larger than life. My favorite artist is Gustave Courbet. My favorite exhibit is "Beyond the Manosphere: Masculinity Today" at the Stedelijk. Impressionism is okay, and I'm convinced that this genre, along with Van Gogh, are the pioneers of modern art.

As for food, well you should already know by now how much I love food. I was very wowed by the Michelin Bib that I went to in Paris (La Savarin). I had a lot of good coffee in Vienna. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to try as much wine as I would have liked, as it is summer and one drinks white wine in the summer (but I like red better!). I did try a couple great cocktails, and I learned that I like my drinks either super boozy (old fashioneds <3) or nice and light and bubbly (sours hurt my tongue, nor do I like it when it's too sweet).

ah I did not expect to write so much about these experiences. I do want to write a post where I review all the places that I've been to, so I might be reusing the above there.

But between all these great experiences, there have been plenty of mid ones. So much so that I'm fairly content with what I've experienced so far. That's why, I'm quite happy with my decision not to go anywhere this weekend. Instead, I get to sit down at a nice little cafe and write without feeling any guilt.

And so back to the topic of writing. After watching the above video, I started entertaining some delusions about writing works that will be read by people that don't know me in real life. It hasn't really left my mind since. I don't know how dedicated I am to doing it, but I would really hope that I could get an essay published at some point if I set my mind to it. And in order to achieve that, I should write more now.

I realized that at the end of the day, all I want to do is stay in my town and find a coffee shop to sit and write. I kind of regret not doing more of this. I miss the feeling of my mild headache being eased as caffeine enters my body. I miss the wonderful smell of coffee and breakfast bagels. I miss the drone of Sunday brunch conversations against a backdrop of hyperpop. I miss the feelings of my fingers against the keys of my keyboard.

I only wish I could remember how nice this feels all the time, so I can remember to do this all the time.